Minnesota’s ‘Giving Holiday’ Hopes to Set More Records in 2017

UNDATED -- Minnesota's "giving holiday" is here, and starting at Midnight Thursday you'll find thousands of causes across the state in one spot.

Since 2009, Give to the Max Day has raised more than $150-million for over 10,000 Minnesota-based causes. Jake Blumberg is the Executive Director for GiveMN, the organization who runs Give to the Max Day.

He says each year Minnesotans set the bar higher and higher for charitable giving.

"Last year, we had nearly 6,000 organizations receive a gift and we raised over $20.1-million on Give to the Max Day. So we're excited we set those records last year and we're excited [to see what happens] on this giving holiday."

The easiest way for you to help on Give to the Max Day is to head to their website, which Blumberg calls a "Google" for non-profits and schools you can donate to.

"One of the things you can do is go into the website and type in a zip-code or county or the type of organization you're looking to support and find a local option that's running a campaign. I can assure you there's a lot of them in Central Minnesota."

There are dozens of causes in the St. Cloud area.The charities on their website are all IRS confirmed 501-3c's or have public school status in Minnesota, which they check "frequently" for new charities and causes to add.

If you have a charity that you'd like added to their database, simply reach out to the help desk on their website, found in the bottom right corner of the screen. Or you can head to their FAQs page.

A special aspect of Give to the Max Day is their picking winners to receive bonuses to donations they've made. Each hour GiveMN will pull a name of a donor to give an extra $1,000 to their chosen cause. At the end of the 24 hours, they'll draw one name, and their donation will be boosted by $10,000.